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ES: Carter and the 'scoop and score' (UPDATED: with video)

themurf

By themurf
in The Stadium

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themurf

themurf

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orakpo121509.jpg

(photo by Brian Murphy)

There’s a lot to like coming out of the Washington Redskins 34-13 domination of the Oakland Raiders this past weekend.

The offense continued to show progress across the board, with tight end Fred Davis and newly-promoted running back Quinton Ganther providing the bulk of the firepower.

The defense, led by a menacing pass rush, finally closed out an opponent after three weeks of failed fourth quarter efforts by sacking Raiders quarterbacks eight times on the day.

Special teams, minus one inept punt returner, stayed out of the way and did a more than adequate job – especially considering Graham Gano earned the kicking job one week prior.

And yet, with so many positives to choose from, we can’t help but turn our attention to something else. That’s because, for the life of us, we simply cannot get the image of defensive end Andre Carter attempting a scoop-and-score situation out of our head.

Here we are, days after the best win of the Jim Zorn era, and all we can see when we think back is Carter, at 6-4, 254 lbs., fumbling around on the ground in a “greased-pig” situation.

As a quick refresher, the Redskins were leading 31-13 with less than eight minutes to go in the game. The Raiders had the ball first-and-10 on the 20, and had no chance of driving 80 yards because JaMarcus Russell was their quarterback.

Redskins rookie defensive end/linebacker Brian Orakpo came flying in from Russell’s blind side and drilled the oversized quarterback from behind – causing the ball to fly out of his hand. Carter saw the loose football sitting on the turf just a few short feet away from the endzone and raced in to score the first touchdown of his nine-year career.

What happened next was the cause of much post-game locker room debate. The cliffnotes version goes something like this – Carter failed to reel in the loose ball and it was eventually recovered by Raiders offensive lineman Mario Henderson.

“I had the perfect view,” said defensive lineman Phillip Daniels. “I was on the sidelines and saw [Orakpo] fly around and strip the ball. I saw the ball laying there, with nobody around. No nothing. And then, I saw Dre come and I said, ‘This is an easy touchdown.’ And then I watched Dre pass the ball. I was like, ‘What the hell did he just do?’ We were just looking at each other on the sidelines, shaking our heads.”

Daniels wasn’t alone in shaking his head.

“I’m disappointed in Andre,” said receiver Devin Thomas. “He really prides himself on his flexibility because he’s so big and muscular. I just knew he was going to get low and scoop that. I know he’s mad, he’s salty about it because he wanted a touchdown. He definitely should have had that one.”

Orakpo left little doubt when asked if he planned on giving Carter grief for not reeling in the would-be touchdown after the rookie caused the fumble on his fourth sack of the day.

“Oh yeah,” he said with a laugh. “I’m gonna lead it because he had an easy touchdown and I don’t think we have a defensive touchdown this whole year. He could have been the first, and he blew it.”

Do you think he just got too excited seeing that ball sitting there just waiting for him?

“I think he did,” Orakpo said. “He normally knows how to pick up a ball, but he got too excited. It was so easy that it made it harder.”

Because the play ultimately didn’t come back to haunt the team, most of the locker room was laughing the play off. Like Orakpo, they all seemed content to have a little fun at Carter’s expense.

“I think we just need to work on that more in practice,” Daniels said. “We need to do some more scoop and score. We ain’t worked on it in a while, but I’m pretty sure it’s coming this week because that was one of those ‘Come On Man’ moments you’re going to see on Monday Night Football for sure.”

In the post-game locker room one player had already made up his mind on how to help Carter avoid future embarrassment, should the situation arise again down the road.

“I just know I have to buy him some stuffed animals for Christmas,” said linebacker Rocky McIntosh. “So he can have something to grab and be soft with. That’s what I’m going to do. Yeah man, he’s just too ripped. He was on a high already from getting a lot of sacks and he just got too excited. He just needs to think of it as him picking up his son.”

Carter watched us as we bounced around the locker room getting different perspectives on the play that could have been. He knew it was coming, and by the time we headed to his stall, he was already cracking up.

Click here for the full article.

carter121509.jpg

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ncr2h

ncr2h

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Not to be "that guy", but I don't think this Carter situation should be taken as lightly as it's being taken. How many defensive TDs have we scored? How many EASY interceptions have we dropped? How many fumbles have we forced, vs. how many we've recovered? We're never going to take the next step as a defense when we leave so many plays on the field. I know it's easy to look at it as one fluke play. But then you think about the Dallas game, with 2 easy picks thrown right to our players and dropped. You think about the Saints game where Landry could have made a pick on that deep ball that he and London Fletcher were in great position for. You think about how this team is consistently at the bottom of the league in scoring, and how our defense is one of (if not THE) worst in the league at scoring points year in and year out. I think the Andre Carter botched fumble recovery is a symptom of a problem that is going to keep going unfixed until the players start taking it seriously.

And granted I said all of the above without knowing what the coaches are actually doing to fix it, but still...whatever they've BEEN doing is clearly not the right way to go.

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themurf

themurf

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Not to be "that guy", but I don't think this Carter situation should be taken as lightly as it's being taken. How many defensive TDs have we scored? How many EASY interceptions have we dropped? How many fumbles have we forced, vs. how many we've recovered?

I understand what you're saying. And if my research is correct, the last time the Redskins scored a defensive touchdown was in a 21-19 win over the Arizona Cardinals way back on Oct. 21, 2007. London Fletcher returned an interception 27 yards for a score.

That being said, the guys were coming off of their first dominating performance in two seasons. The offense and defense both were clicking and the 34 points they put up were more than enough. So yeah, they had a little laugh at Carter's expense. But I wouldn't automatically assume that no one at Redskins Park cared that the defense failed to secure the turnover and/or put points on the board.

That's a bit much. Like Phillip Daniels said in the article, he knew they'd be working on 'scoop and score' plays this week in practice.

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ncr2h

ncr2h

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I understand what you're saying. And if my research is correct, the last time the Redskins scored a defensive touchdown was in a 21-19 win over the Arizona Cardinals way back on Oct. 21, 2007. London Fletcher returned an interception 27 yards for a score.

That being said, the guys were coming off of their first dominating performance in two seasons. The offense and defense both were clicking and the 34 points they put up were more than enough. So yeah, they had a little laugh at Carter's expense. But I wouldn't automatically assume that no one at Redskins Park cared that the defense failed to secure the turnover and/or put points on the board.

That's a bit much. Like Phillip Daniels said in the article, he knew they'd be working on 'scoop and score' plays this week in practice.

Yeah, I feel what you're saying. And you were there, so you have more context with these quotes than I do. I just get pissed off when I see skins fans claiming we have this great D, and then I see Philly's D (who many on here would claim is inferior) has 4 defensive TDs this year alone...which is more than we've had total since 2005. I really wish our coaches would work on this, so seeing our guys joking about something like this rubs me the wrong way. But I understand the situation.

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herb mul-key

herb mul-key

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he was so there and like Devin Thomas said he displayed amazing flexibility to get in PERFECT position to grab that ball...however..right when he was ready to scoop.. the ball bounced from being horizontal to being vertical and damn it squeezed right through like a round peg in a round hole....just a tough bounce for old "salad tongs". lol

LUUUUUUVVVVVV Dre! Class player all the way...leader of men. Core Redskin. Next time Dre!

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bedlamVR

bedlamVR

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"had no chance of driving 80 yards because JaMarcus Russell was their quarterback."

I loled at that ... wasn't their a thread somewhere with people arguing that Russell was better than Campbell ?

One thing though this D is great at stopping other teams scorring but when they either have the ball or a chance to score it is like the Keystone cops ..

At least Dre might have taken some heat off Moore for the pick -6 against the Saints .. I am sure Carter wont do that again in the same situation .

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